


Last Chance

by GalacticTwink



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: Anger, Angst and Feels, Character Death, Connor Murphy (Dear Evan Hansen) Deserves Better, Dead Connor Murphy (Dear Evan Hansen), Depressing, Fire, Hanging, Hurt No Comfort, Other, Overdose, Post-Canon, Regret, Self-Hatred, Self-Reflection, Sorry Not Sorry, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Suicide Notes, The Author Regrets Everything, connor murphy is wiccan, dead evan hanson, kind of, no one is happy, vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-28
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-04-14 06:34:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14130192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalacticTwink/pseuds/GalacticTwink
Summary: When you're lost and broken and you can't even find yourself anymore, it feels like there's nowhere else to go.  Like you're out of options. Except one.





	1. Evan

    Evan turns off his car, tucking the keys into the visor above his head and leaving the doors unlocked when he gets out. The night air is cold and still, fireflies blinking and swirling around him and in the grass beneath his feet. It’s beautiful here at night, the stars twinkling down from above; giving Evan false promises of something more. Something bigger than himself. Anything else but being here on the ground. But they’re just dead little spots of light, they can’t make his wishes come true. He pops the trunk, taking his bag and shutting it again. The tree is still here, standing tall as it ever has, uncaring and unaware. Evan doesn’t believe in rebirth but if he did he would want to be reborn as a tree. They’re grand and straight and unchanging. This mighty evergreen is the very same that he plunged from the branches of months earlier, landing himself in the hospital. Not high enough. He didn’t try hard enough. It’s dark, but Evan knows the knot by hand. He could tie this one with his eyes closed and it’s done in seconds, tight and strong as his shaking hands could manage. The remaining contents of the bag is shoved into his pants pocket, giving him both hands to climb. Grab, pull, find a foothold. Grab, pull, find a foothold. Repeat. And keep repeating. His dad taught him how to climb, so many years ago. At least the man ended up helping him do something in his life. He’s higher now than he was before, than he’s ever been before. But he keeps going, splinters sticking into the palms of his hands and branches catching on his clothing as he moves up into the thick of the tree. The branches here are large and sturdy, big enough to hold his weight and more. Just a little higher.. Evan swings over onto a branch, sitting on the surface and steadying himself on the trunk with one hand. Okay. He takes a deep breath. It takes a few tries to loop up around the branch above him, making that knot large and going over it twice just to make sure it’s going to hold for as long as it needs to. He finds his last entry in his pocket and unfolds it, unable to read it in this light but knowing it by heart anyway.

    “Dear... Evan.. Hanson.” he begins shakily, exhaling sharply and closing his eyes. He feels dizzy already.

    “I wish that this could’ve been different. I wish I was born different, not like I am. I wish I knew why the world hates me, why I’m cursed. I wish I wasn’t a burden on everyone I meet. And on myself. I wish I could be my own person, not relying on others. I wish I wasn’t me. But I can wish all I want and nothing will ever change. Nothing ever changes and I am never going to change. I’m never going to get better. I’m never going to be okay. I’ll never be normal or good or.. Whole. I’m so broken, I don’t think I remember what it was like to be happy. I thought I was. But it was a lie. Everything was a lie and maybe I am too. No one knows the real me, just what I told them. The lie and the life I fabricated so they would want me. So I could be wanted. And they did and it worked, so why can’t I be happy? Connor. Connor who I never knew and now no one can remember. I hope you went to heaven, because I don’t want to see you in hell. I ruined you, I ruined everything. They all want to remember you but it isn’t really you that they’re remembering. Just my lies, what I thought they wanted to hear. But you weren’t what they wanted to hear because no one heard you. And that was why and I understand. You weren’t a good person, I know that now. But I don’t think you deserved it. You burned and you were harsh and people saw you for all the reasons you wanted them to. You were a rebel and you could have made a difference. I didn’t make a difference. I thought I was giving you a voice, but all I did was take the one you had away. You were more than a statistic and you were more than just the misunderstood little boy that I made you out to be. You were sharp and you were sick and you were in pain and you just wanted to be heard and you did something about it. You were better than me. You had your own voice and you were using it. And I am so sorry. I’m sorry that I’m so selfish and I wanted all the attention and I couldn’t just speak up and tell them they were wrong. I thought it would hurt them more but I’m the one that hurt them. I thought I could make you more than you were but I didn’t realise that you were already so much and so important. I am so sorry. And, If I’m going somewhere after this I hope you won’t be too hard on me. But if you are, I deserve it. I know I’m going to hell, but I hope you’re an angel.” Evan wipes his face with the back of his hand, letting a shuddering sob escape his mouth and startle a few birds nearby. He swallows thickly. 

    “Sincerely, Me.” the letter goes back into his pocket, pencil on the page now smeared and blotted with tears. Should he pray? Evan isn’t like his mom, who is very white, very Jewish, and very middle class, but it couldn’t hurt. He clasps his hands together but.. Doesn’t have anything to say. Evan is sorry. He’s sorry for existing. He’s sorry for not being able to love himself. He’s sorry for so many things, but he can’t be sorry for what he’s about to do. This is what’s right. This is all he has left. This is his last chance to do something right. This is his only option now, he can’t go back. It’s prickly and coarse on his skin, almost tickling but just hard enough to be too uncomfortable for that. It feels harsh and final. Evan swallows, twisting his arm around at an awkward angle to adjust the knot until he feels the cold material on all sides of his neck. He stands, one hand on the trunk of the tree and the other still clutching onto the rope, and looks down. He can’t see the ground from here. Evan slacks his grip on the rope and takes a deep breath, closing his eyes and taking one last step forward.


	2. Connor

Pills clink against each other as Connor shakes the little orange bottle out into his hand, knocking them back dry to chase what he’s already taken across the last hour. He’s already starting to feel his body protesting in the churn of his stomach and the tingle in his fingertips. He probably wouldn’t be able to hold himself up if he tried to stand. He feels.. Foggy and dizzy and disoriented. Connor strikes a match and lights a candle, hovering his hand over the flame until he feels the burn. With shaking hands he takes up a clean pen and dabs the nib into one of the slits across his wrist, using the fresh blood to draw the bold lines of a design on one of the paper fragments scattered around his room. The interlocking lines and loops come straight from his mind and the moment, ending off with a dot on either side of the root line. He lets the sigil dry before holding it over the small flame, watching fire lick over the paper and curl it up to his fingers. It burns him, but Connor barely feels it. 

    “Please, make the pain go away.” he whispers, giving his sigil meaning before it’s completely eaten up by the flame. It’s a little late for that, but there’s still one way for it to stop. Connor squeezes his hand into a fist, getting as much feeling back into his fingers as he can before grabbing for his sketchbook. Most pages are already filled but he finds one at the back that’s still void of any design. He touches pencil to paper but.. Doesn’t remember what it was he wanted to write. What’s the use leaving them a note when they don’t care? His parents, his sister, the few friends he used to have.. They’ve all given up on him by now. This is it, this is what he brought himself to. Tingling pain and numbness creeping up his body, Connor feels a moment of pure clarity. He did this to himself. He drove them away, he became a monster and he couldn’t stop the downward spiral until it was already too late to go back. 

    “Whoever it might concern,” he starts again, scratching across the paper in handwriting he’s sure no one will ever be able to read even if they wanted to. What is there to say?

    “I’m not sorry. Not for killing myself. Not for hating myself. Not for being myself in a world filled with mindless fucking drones. I’m an all original and if the world can’t handle that. I guess it’s better off without me anyway. I refuse to be a fucking copy. I won’t bow down and obey and let the world make me its bitch. I’m my own bitch and I’m shitty and worthless but at least I’m actually a fucking person. I am so angry. At the world. At my parents. At the therapists and counsellors who desperately tried to force me into their mold. At myself for letting it get to me.” Connor pauses, trying several times to hit his lighter and light the other candles around him. He tries to think of something to recite, but no spells came to mind. Maybe that kind of thing doesn’t really matter in the end anyway. 

    “I’m not going anywhere,” he resumes, handwriting growing worse than usual “at least, I don’t deserve to go anywhere. I want to disappear. It’s better than being their freak to shove into the spotlight to point at. I’m not an example for them to use. I’m like a broken thing that people kicked and stomped on because it’s already broken, why not fuck it up even more? So they say ‘stay in line and be good, or you’ll end up like that’.This is the last thing. My last chance to do something for myself. I am not sorry. I can’t be sorry for who I am because I wasn’t what you wanted me to be. ” Connor doesn’t bother signing the note, discarding his pencil across the floor and folding the paper; meticulously making each crease perfect. He holds the square gently in his quaking hand, inching it forward ever so slightly until the bright flame of his candle catches it, fire licking up the surface and curling the ends. It burns brightly, quickly leaving behind charred remains and moving forward across the surface. It reaches Connor’s hand, batting at his numb fingers and blackening his nails. He sighs. It’s been so long since he’s felt something so warm.

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't kill or hurt yourself. You are so important and even if it doesn't feel like it to you, you matter. Every single one of us here is unique, and the world will never be the same without you. You are amazing.


End file.
